Korea’s CJ ENM & Japan’s Toei Animation Form Strategic Partnership

Korean entertainment powerhouse CJ ENM has entered into a strategic partnership with leading Japanese animation studio Toei Animation as it continues to expand its global footprint. Under the agreement, the two companies will collaborate across both their libraries and team to create new product including television series, films and animation. The tie-up will also allow both to tap each other’s regional markets.

CJ ENM is is Korea’s foremost film and television studio, cable operator and music producer. Best known for multiple Oscar winner Parasite, the company’s film credits also include Snowpiercer and Miss Granny. Series credits range from Crash Landing On You to Goblin: The Lonely And Great God and Hospital Playlist while it is also behind music format I Can See Your Voice; stage credits include the Tony Award winning Broadway production Kinky Boots.

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CJ further has a strategic investment in David Ellison’s Skydance Media and is currently co-producing a drama series with the U.S.-based company. It is also involved in the production of the TV-adaptation of Parasite with HBO.

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The company has been on a global expansion push over the past year looking to form partnerships with content creators in the U.S., Europe and Asia.

Toei has produced numerous series including the Dragon Ball Z and One Piece franchises as well as Galaxy Express 999 and Sailor Moon. Its library numbers 13,100 episodes, including 255 feature films and 288 television series.

The two partners will now work closely to co-produce premium content that appeals to a global audience, be it new projects or those based on existing IP. They have formed a task-force with creatives from both sides to accelerate production.

“Toei Animation’s IP has great potential for transmedia or cross-media storytelling, as they have an existing strong global fandom and appeals to a wide range of age groups. We are also excited to see how CJ ENM’s original content that expands over 5,000 different IPs will be able open new doors of creative possibilities for Toei Animation,” said Jongmin Yi, Senior Vice President of CJ ENM’s Content R&D Center. “Through this strategic partnership, we plan to develop never-seen-before transmedia contents in both Korea and Japan.”

Added Takashi Washio, Executive Officer and Executive Producer of Production Department at Toei Animation, “We look forward to working with CJ ENM, a company that has been recognized for its borderless content and its influence in shaping some of the new trends in the global media entertainment landscape. Combined with Toei Animation’s know-hows from a wealth of experience and accomplishments in producing global animation hits, we are confident that the two companies will be able to create synergy to create global mega-hit contents.”